Bill looked up at his son, surprised. He was unsure of what to say or how to respond to this brief moment of intimacy, so uncommon in their relationship - in any of Bill's relationships. The secret had put a veil between himself and others. He loved his children, but they were strangers. With the veil pulled back, it was as if he met John at last.

The joke offered a merciful relief on tension and he cracked a smile. "Aye, yer mum won't like it," he said quietly, his mind still on the secret revealed and on the reporter and on his children. "But she cannot blame ye for this one. If the alternative is prison." The word made him feel sick.